


Knowing

by ralfmacchio



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Episode Related, F/M, Fluff, I made this up, Idiots in Love, Mushy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-15
Updated: 2018-10-15
Packaged: 2019-08-02 10:27:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16303433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ralfmacchio/pseuds/ralfmacchio
Summary: A collection of blurbs that take place between or extended moments in episodes. Generally inspired by promo stills or previews of next episodes when I can’t bare to wait to see what happens!Part one takes place between chapters 25  (2.12) and 26 (2.13) before the latter aired.Part two takes place after chapter 36 (3.1) and is inspired by current promotional shot.When you give your heart to someone, knowing you also have theirs is sometimes the scariest part.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! This is my first attempt at writing in a very long time. I often have certain scenes or stories in my head but cannot turn them into written words. This first part takes place after our couple have their first time together and Betty returned home to a dead body! In the weeks waiting for the new episode I was so anxious about how this turn would effect their newly mended relationship so I wrote this. Below are my orginal notes:
> 
> “Last night’s episode was exactly what my heart needed! Unlike some others I’ve seen in the fandom I am fine with them not exchanging “I love you”s, and Betty not revealing her truths. For me, it was Jughead who was showing his love to her by being vulnerable and honest for the first time all season. He pushed her away and hurt them both. He was at his lowest and she wants him still. That means something to someone who has always been passed over like Jug. We’ll get the rest in time. 
> 
> As calm and sure as I feel next weeks’ episode is giving me ANXIETY. I know the drama will be short lived but here’s me trying to work through Jughead’s feelings. This is sort of how I make drawings too, by creating a narrative. You can expect some doodles to accompany this blurb soon, haha.“

**Knowing.**

 

He had been under water with pressure coming in on him on all sides and not knowing which way was up. With Betty - when Betty told him we was wanted - wanted - such a foreign word to him- it had all fallen away. Not a big gasping breath but a sudden moment of realization that struck him –

Oh.

Holding her in his arms and dusting kisses over her face, her neck, her collar bone, her chest - he noticed that _pressure_ \- that constant ache that was on him at all times - had just slipped away. No ghost of it anywhere to be found.

_‘I want you…’ ‘I want you…’ ‘I want you….’_ was an echo chamber in his head - his heart beating in rhythm, his breath coming calm and sure like the hard consonants in her name. Every step he took felt SURE for the first time in longer than he could remember. It was as if the Earth had been knocked off its axis and had now been tilted back into place.

When he saw her next (he had suggested she stay, his hands, surer now, wandering over all of curves. Her eyes had twinkled, and she had laughed with him, but insisted she had to return home, for the very least not to leave her brother alone in that house) she was…

Stricken.

He would be a fool to not notice the change in her - she was pulled tight, like her signature ponytail -jumping out of her skin and tears rimming her eyes periodically.

The change in her startled him - she had been so soft and sure under him. Her lips parting in pleasure as he discovered his favorite parts of her. Seeing her face now in that crowded room he had slid his hand over to hers - hoping to reach her and touch her in the same comforting way she always did for him - but she pulled her hand away. The action was so sudden and startling that if felt like a cracked whip. Her green eyes turned on him - horrified, before she excused herself to retreat to the bathroom.

His mouth was dry. His own voice - clear, crisp and damning - closed in on his mind “She does not want you. Nobody wants you.” the feeling crashed on him so quickly, and finitely that he couldn’t see. He felt the familiar feeling of anger bubbling in him - the ever-present companion to heart break. It swelled and raised up to protect him. To push, to shove away and to run.

A memory of a smaller sound tugged at him, though- her laugh as her mouth smiled at him sweetly. He had caught that smile with his mouth over and over - relishing in her giggle trapped behind his own smile. His mind flipped suddenly- thinking of her timid confession,

_“I never stopped loving you, Jug. I don’t think that I can.”_

A breath slipped through his cracked lips.

It was something else. It had to be. That moment Archie had broken his heart for Betty he had let this feeling overcome him. Betrayal and rage pushing him to seek comfort in Toni. He knows Betty. He believes Betty when she says she wants him. Loves him. Pushing down the self-hatred and doubt boiling in his chest was one of the most difficult things he ever had to do, but he did it.

He lived the next few days suspended – focusing on anything else other than the doubt his chest – his dad, on the trailer park evictions, on investigating Hiram Lodge. His calls went unanswered. Her texts were short and cryptic – assuring she was fine. He knew that them being together was what they both wanted. He knew that night in the trailer on the dingy couch was perfect. He knew it, he did. He would never let his own doubt come between them again. It was something else – something worse. He knew it.

Days later, when he saw her name on his screen, he was vibrating more than the device in his hand – shaking with relief and terror at the same time. Swiping it open – the need to hear her voice on the other end the only thing he knew - he couldn’t recall the exact words that were exchanged, just a plea for him to be there, to come over now. The wind was whipping around him before he realized he was even on his motorcycle.

The pristine houses on Elm Street were a vacant blur to him. Her crying face was all he could see when she stepped off of her porch to meet him. Then she was in his arms and at that moment he DID know. He knew with every inch of his own body that whatever was happening was not about them, or her doubting her feelings for him, or regretting what had happened between them in the quiet of the night. Being together was the only true thing in the world.

That certainty, that truth, was what propped up is resolve when he demanded she tell him what was happening to her. Her reveal of murder, dead bodies and storm drains snaked out of the mouth he adored like a nightmare. The green eyes that had shone on him with feeling and comfort now stared wide at him, frozen in a state of terror. He listened as the tale unraveled, a frown split across his brow. Her hands clutch at his jacket, and it wasn’t until he slid her hand into his that he realized how broken and bloody her palms were.

She paused to intake a shuddering breath and his question pulled from him on its own volition “Where it is? The body. Tell me exactly where it is.”

She blinked rapidly but returned his question with a soft response. Trusting him completely. His heart swelled with his certainty. He knew, he knew.

He stood and disentangled himself from her, but she sprang up, grasping at him, panic wide in her eyes again. A plea to stay ripped from her mouth and then pain and hurt shot across her face, her trembling voice demanding to know where he was going.

His reply was incredulous – her question a mystery to him. If he knew so securely, shouldn’t she? He replied truthfully - he was going to take care of it. They were going to take care of it and make sure she was safe. There was no doubt, no question, only certainty.

Her eyes, filled with tears, seemed to hold, behind everything, the deep relief he himself felt stamped on his heart. Her final question, short and sad, bubbled from her lips, “What…?”

It was then that his hands came to her face, his thumbs pressing into her high points on her cheeks, and their gazes locked in on each other. His voice was laced with gravel, thick with the  need have her know, too, “Do you have any idea how much I love you?”

 

Fin.

  
  



	2. Knowing Pt. II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is sort of a follow up to my last piece, but from Betty’s POV, which I really enjoyed writing. Again, I am no writer, sometimes I just have things in my head I wanna write out. This was inspired by the promo shot of Betty and Jughead kissing with his hat in his hand, and by the ending of the season premiere. Mild spoilers ahead! Follow me on tumblr if you so desire! I mostly post doodles :) @whisperilllistentohearit

Her entire body froze the moment her gaze flittered across the old photograph. Her own smile, the one she had spent countless shameful hours flashing into her mirror, critiquing the shape, how much her teeth showed, the way her cheeks bunch around her eyes, was turned up to her from a frozen snapshot in time. Confusion prickled at her mind as she lifted the photograph and flipped it over, looking for an explanation or a notation, like the kind she inscribed on the back of her own photographs in pristine hand writing before tucking them into the frame of her mirror, but found only a blank back.

It was taken in a class room that didn’t stick out in her memory in any way, her own figure sitting at a desk, slightly turned away and erupting in laughter. She knew instantly that it was taken without her knowledge, or she would not have let her smile grow so broad, her gums showing. Judging from her clothing in the image and the roundness of her face she could guess it was taken a year, or perhaps two, prior.

She lifted her gaze to her beanie-clad partner, both of them standing out in the unfamiliar space. His suspenders were stretched over his rounded shoulders and his face was turned away as he crouched over a wide desk, pulling drawers open, shuffling through art supplies and drawings, his long fingers grazing over pens, markers, papers, unsure of what they were looking for. Betty spoke after only a moment of hesitation.

“It’s me.” She declared almost too loudly in the quiet room.

Jughead’s blue eyes flicked to her immediately, his brow already furrowed from his hasty investigation through Dilton’s personal belongings. Betty watched his gaze drift to the photo she was holding up towards him, her own confusion mirrored in his expression until is cleared away to recognition, or understanding? Before she could name is properly his face shifted to smug, the small smirk that played across his mouth confused her further. And irritated her.

Which must have reflected on her face as her mouth snapped open to demand an explanation. Jughead raised his hands up, his palms out in mercy right before she began full steam, “Why is this here!? Tucked away in a book, even! Was he trying to involve me in these rituals – Why are you smiling??”

“Ah – I’m not.” Jughead began, his hand reaching to his beanie as if to tug it, but his stayed suspended near his eyeline “You see, he is– was - “ he grimaced at his own use of present tense, licking his lips to restart his statement,

“He sort of… Had a thing for you.” His hand fell to the back of his neck, the unique composition of shame coming from breaking a confidence filtering across his face. Which she recognized easily from years of her countless demands of which girl Archie was interested in, wanting to know what Ethel had passed to Jughead in a note, demanding there be no secrets between the boys and herself.

“What..? Did he say that to you?”

Jughead shook his head, crossing his arms across his chest and lifting his shoulders in a small shrug, his gaze landing on her face again, something guarded in his eyes.

“No, but he didn’t need to.”

“Since.. When?” Her mind filled suddenly with Dilton, his nervous smile, his glasses constantly partially fogged. Insisting she read his favorite fantasy novel, offering to help her with her biology homework. Handing her a small, sloppily wrapped Christmas during secret Santa. The loss of this person she didn’t make enough effort to know, the reality that he was gone consumed her, filling her lungs with a painful ice grip. The room seemed to tilt under her feet, too warm and too muggy, this room was suddenly unbearable – which she had never stepped foot in until 10 minutes prior – filled with his things, his memories, his –what right does she have- oh God.

‘Betts”, her heart throbbed again as the familiar sensation of Jughead’s palm resting against her cheek cut through the panic. Her hand lifted to his chest, her palm flat against the spot where his heart resided. She counted the rhythm, strong and sure under her scarred skin. She allowed herself several moments of counting, the feel of his heartbeat one of her favorite sensations, before she lifted her gaze to his to repeat, “Since when?”

The question was met with his soft, concerned look she was so familiar with, that she somehow both loved and hated, that made her feel cherished and hatefully fragile simultaneously. His mouth formed a crooked line of indecision momentarily before he shrugged again, his chest rising with movement under her palm.

“Since…I don’t know. Since you wore that yellow dress…The one that was sort of crinkly material and had the bow in the back? Freshman year.”

She furrowed her brow, seeking the memory in her mind.

“You looked like lemon meringue.” He added softly, not quite teasing. Food he always took seriously.

A second wave of demanding questions was forming in her throat but stilled to silence when he continued, “Since our seventh grade science fair? When you did your presentation on those slugs, but you couldn’t complete your experiment because you became too attached to them. You spent the entire presentation explaining their personalities and why you named them after leaders of the women’s suffrage movement.”

A smile erupted on her face at the memory, recalling how she made Archie and Jughead help her return each beautiful slug back to their natural habitat, both boys gagging and complaining the whole time.

Had Dilton been in that class with them?

Her smile fell.

“Since you yelled at Reggie and called him ugly when he made Ethel cry in fifth grade?”

Betty blinked.

“You walked her home and baked her cookies the next day. They were peanut butter with a Hershey kiss stuck in the middle.”

Unexpectedly, Jughead flushed furiously, and took a step back from her. His arms wrapped across his chest, his weight shifting to lean against Dilton’s desk as he shifted his gaze away from her. She could see the flush on the tips of his ears.

Later, when writing in her journal, Betty wouldn’t be able to describe this moment to fully explain how it felt when this warmth, prickling really, started at her scalp, filled her face with heat, sent her heart plummeting into her stomach and her knees actually weaken and begin to shake. It was like the sun rising, like waking up anxiety free, like getting glasses and seeing a flower up close, this whole new beautiful world opening up to her.

It wasn’t until this very moment did she realize that she had this amazing, big hearted, mess of a boy by her side, loving her this entire time. He had loved her always.

(She knew, very clearly remembered now, that Dilton was always around on the weekends and summers, but he had undoubtedly spent fourth through eighth grade at a military school that he had begged his parents to go to. He returned to class with them after an incident in which he had pulled a practical joke on another student with itching powder who ended up having a severe allergic reaction that sent them to the hospital.)

Having also realized his slip Jughead huffed a little annoyed breath as a smile blossomed across her face, down to her toes, to the tips of her fingers, “Juggie…” she began, closing the space between them tentatively.

He pushed at his hat nervously, tugging on his hair in a familiar, anxious habit.

These moments of self-doubt and hesitation were much fewer and farther between at this stage in their relationship. The confidence that he had of her love for him typically radiated from his skin. He would drum it out from his long fingers to the length of her torso as they lay next to each other, exhausted and spent from passion. He would hold the truth of her undeniable love tucked away in the corner of his lips, always ready to pull into a smile.

This moment of vulnerability and fear felt like the last of its kind, breaking away this last hidden piece of his heart. He pulled his hat off in a fist, running his other hand through his hair a few times, readying himself to speak. She gave him this moment, this last vestige of the wall he kept around his heart that he had torn down for her. To love her and be loved by her.

Both arms were crossed across his chest in a protective pose, his hat fisted into the crook of one his elbows. His mouth was set in a stern line, but his were so, so soft when they met hers, “You are very easy to love.”

She closed the distance between them fully, pressing her body against the length of his, pushing her hips into his, threading her fingers through his hair, cupping his jaw, tilting his beautiful, stubborn face up to her own to kiss him sternly.

She held him firm and true, not caring they were wasting their snooping time, not caring they were in a strange room. She stood a little taller than him with him sitting and took advantage of the delicious angle, tipping his head back, pressing soft insistent kisses to his lips, his checks, his nose, his jaw. While his body language remained rigid, tucked into himself, his face was soft and peaceful. His eyelashes jumping and resting with each soft kiss she gave to him.

She had never really been that good with words, not the way Jughead was. He was witty, he was thoughtful. Yes, she could investigate, and push herself and write a flaming article with great talking points, but when it came to expressing her own feelings in her own voice she stumbled. She tripped up and repeated herself. She never quite got the words out the way she wanted, they never sounded to her hears the way she was shouting them from her heart.  There were so many things she wanted to tell him that didn’t sound right with her voice.

So, she slipped her useless tongue against his gently, wanting tell him everything this way. To say, thank you for loving me all along. You are easy to love, too.

She knew that she would probably feel this small guilt in her heart forever. Partially hating herself for not knowing of or being able to discuss with Dilton his affection for her, and partially hating herself that she could not truthfully tell Jughead that she always felt the same for him as he did for her. She could pour all of her love and longing and heartache into this kiss and this boy, and he would be there to take it all from her.

Eventually, and all toon soon (remembering where they were and that a grieving family was sure to walk in on them at any moment) Betty pulled away from Jughead slowly, his mouth traveling with her, his lips the last point to lose contact. His eyes opened slowly, blurrily, grief and love mixed together in his achingly beautiful gaze.

Betty had to swallow down the emotion that rushed through her, causing the corner of her eyes to prickle. Her gaze landed on the ground between them to the blank photo back innocently empty to them now.

Jughead reached over to pick up the photo that had fluttered out of her hand. It wasn’t until he was lifting himself back up with the photo in hand facing towards them did she notice the most important detail. Mostly cut off by the framing of the shot, but in the corner, clear as day, and in the direction photo-Betty was turned to,  the source of her carefree laughter, was a hand on a desk. A hand she’d know anywhere, from countless touches and moments being intertwined with her own. The hand that touch her own bloodied palms and covered them with understanding and acceptance.

Betty placed the tip of her index finger on the photo-hand that she adored and declared, “It’s you.”

Jughead jolted in surprise as he whipped his gaze to hers from the photo, her smile warming in response to his wide eyes. He blinked at her for a beat, before his features melted into her favorite half small, his eyes softening and turning her to goo all over again.

Reaching into his pocket he withdrew is wallet, folding the picture to slide it into one of slim pockets before returning it to the worn square in his jeans. His eyes flicked to her before softly wondering, “Think he’ll mind..?”

Betty shook her head softly, her ponytail brushing along the line of her shoulders, and her smile faded with the movement.

As they left the darkened bedroom dusk began filtering through the window, casting long orange shadows across the walls. In time with their padding steps Jughead’s hand slipped warmly into hers, as it often so easily did. Betty turned over her shoulder to gaze back into the room belonging to a boy she did not know well enough and closed her eyes for one quite moment. She said a small little prayer from her heart to Dilton, again, not having the right words…

I’m sorry. Thank you.


End file.
